Friday, January 20, 2012

Jesuit University of Scranton to Welcome Pro-Abortion Speaker

SIGN YOUR INSTANT EMAIL PROTEST HEREWhile thousands of pro-life Americans prepare to attend the annual March for Life in Washington, D.C., the Jesuit University of Scranton, located in Pennsylvania, makes very different preparations.

Marjorie Margolies

Former Congresswoman and avowed abortion advocate Marjorie Margolies has been invited to give the keynote speech at the University of Scranton’s Ready to Run: Campaign Training for Women program. The event is scheduled on January 28, according to the university’s web site.

On January 13, the bishop of Scranton, the Most Rev. Joseph C. Bambera, issued a formal statement and asked that the invitation be withdrawn. But his request was rebuffed by university officials.

One wonders how this Catholic university qualifies invited speakers. Clearly not on the grounds of Catholicism, since Ms. Margolies has publicly taken action against the Church’s timeless teachings on the sanctity of innocent human life. Particularly notable is her persistent opposition to the Hyde Amendment, which restricts the use of federal funds to procure abortion, even going so far as to say that:

“If the Year of the Woman showed how far women had come, the day of the Hyde Amendment vote showed how much further women had to go.”1

The Cardinal Newman Society reports that Ms. Margolies co-sponsored the Abortion Clinic Access Bill, “which sought to make it a federal crime to impede access to abortion clinics.”

After the end of her congressional career, her pro-abortion record only got worse, culminating in her position as Executive Director of the Women’s Campaign Fund, a pro-abortion organization dedicated to “dramatically increasing the number of women in elected office who support reproductive choices and options, from all parties and at all levels of government.”2 As we all know, “reproductive choices” is simply a loaded term often used to disguise the sin of procured abortion.

How can it be that a woman with such a pro-abortion record is invited to give not only a lecture, but a keynote address, at a Catholic institute, which ought to be a cornerstone in the defense of innocent life?

Furthermore, how can a Catholic university allow Ms. Margolies to be at the helm of a training program that purports to prepare leaders for public office? What kind of future political leaders does the university hope to shape: Defenders of Catholic truth? Or willing pawns of the Culture of Death? SIGN YOUR PROTEST HERE